Hi,
I understand that, by default, in LED Production, the LED wall frustum and digital extension are not affected by the tracking system's focus encoder. Any adjustments must currently be made manually through their respective control panels:
- Frustum – Focus Distance property
- Digital Extension – Blur property
I would like to check whether it is possible to configure the system so that the LED wall frustum and digital extension automatically follow the camera's focus changes. In other words, when the camera focus is adjusted via the tracking system's focus encoder, can the Frustum Focus Distance and Digital Extension Blur parameters be updated accordingly?
Hi tanguanlong,
Unfortunately, Aximmetry does not currently offer a direct, clear-cut solution for this, but we plan to add one in the future.
For now, you can use a workaround in the Flow Editor to achieve the same effect.
Keep in mind that this setup works best if the focus distance is smaller or equal to the LED walls' distance from the camera.
To set this up, assemble the flow graph as shown below:
With this setup, you can create custom focus distance curves in the Sequence Editor, which can be opened by double-clicking the Sequencer module. These curves will be driven by the focus distance data received from your camera tracking device.
The Delta module starts the Sequencer whenever the camera focus distance changes.
The Logarithm module is optional. We included it to make editing the curves easier, due to the logarithmic nature of focus distance.
To apply the values set in the Sequencer, use Sequence Scalar modules. These output the parameters as scalar values. Connect their outputs to Set Scalar Pin modules, which will send the scalar values to the pins referenced in their Pin input.
These should reference the Blur pin on the DIGITAL EXTENSION control panel and the Focus Distance pin on the FRUSTUM control panel:
It is important that you enable Auto Set so that every value change is applied to the referenced pins.
Also, add a third Set Scalar Pin module to apply the camera’s aperture value to the Frustum’s Aperture pin, ensuring the most accurate virtual depth of field:
In this setup, the Blur of the Digital Extension and the Focus Distance of the Frustum need to be handled separately, using two different tracks/curves.
The example curves we created in the Sequence Editor are tailored to our setup, so you will need to adjust them to match yours. However, they should provide a good reference for the approximate curve shapes:
We recommend adding at least two keyframes to each track: one for the minimum focus distance and one for the maximum focus distance, which is the LED wall’s distance in this use case. By editing the Value parameter of these keyframes, you can dial in the appropriate values for the Digital Extension Blur and Frustum Focus Distance.
To adjust the values between these keyframes, you can either add more keyframes or add Bezier and modify the slopes for smoother transitions.
For more information on using the Sequence Editor, please see our documentation:
https://aximmetry.com/learn/virtual-production-workflow/scripting-in-aximmetry/sequencing/sequencer-and-sequence-editor/
Warmest regards,
Adam